Chapter 2

Chapter 2 – The Prelude to Vengeance

Erin awoke as though torn from sleep by madness, her body seized by a thirst so fierce it felt like fire crawling down her throat. A feverish dryness scalded her lungs, so sharp and relentless that her skin prickled with a cold sweat. She reached with trembling urgency, her hand snatching at the cup of water on the table beside her bed. She lifted it clumsily, almost violently, and drank deep. The water went down in desperate gulps, but the agony refused to fade.

It was not enough. It was never enough.

With a frustrated growl, Erin seized the bottle itself and pressed it to her lips, tilting her head back to drink. She poured the liquid down her throat so quickly that she choked, sputtering, coughing it back up as the water sprayed from her lips onto the floor. Her chest heaved, and still the dryness within her would not relent.

Her fingers tightened around the bottle, and her breath came in ragged bursts. The thirst was unquenchable, merciless, a torment that made her temples throb. It sparked anger in her heart, a seething rage that left her unable to think of anything but her suffering.

“Damn it,” Erin muttered under her breath, her voice low and hoarse. With sudden violence she hurled the bottle away from her. It struck the wall with a sharp crack and shattered, fragments scattering across the stone floor like shards of ice.

Eighteen years.

For eighteen years she had woken to this torment, trapped in the same dream, night after night, unable to escape. She had thought time might dull it, that repetition would blunt the edge of horror. But no—her body and mind refused familiarity. The dream remained as vivid, as raw, as the first time.

In that dream, she saw herself as she once was—a child. But sometimes the roles shifted. Sometimes she was no longer the trembling child but the monster she hated, gazing outward through the eyes of her enemy. The circumstances remained unchanged, the slaughter the same, but the perspective twisted, shifting until she could no longer tell who was hunter and who was prey.

Yet no matter how the dream distorted, the face of her enemy never changed.

“Let us meet again.”

The voice echoed in her mind, soft, unbearably gentle, and sickening in its warmth. Erin ground her teeth at the memory, rubbing both hands over her face in a harsh, dry motion that only made her cheeks burn. The sound of her own teeth gnashing carried through the empty chamber.

She could not escape it. Not the dream. Not the thirst. Both haunted her without respite. The thirst, if anything, grew sharper with each passing day, until her nerves were always strung tight, her temper always on the verge of snapping. The servants in her household had grown so wary of her moods that they placed bottles of water at every turn, so she would never be without one within reach.

Erin seized another bottle now, her hand closing around it with trembling force. She uncorked it and drank again. The liquid eased down her throat, but it was not enough to quiet the gnawing thirst. Always, it remained. Always, it demanded more.

Her lips parted against the rim of the bottle. Her eyes burned. In that moment she thought again of him—the demon. The dream and the thirst were bound to him; she felt it in her bones. The memory of his voice, the memory of his presence, returned to her unbidden.

The Demon had existed. She had not imagined it. He had spoken to her once, promising they would meet again, mocking her with his survival when everything else she loved had been reduced to ash.

She could still feel the frail, cooling weight of her grandmother’s corpse in her arms, the memory so sharp it pressed against her heart as though it had happened only yesterday. That body, scorched by fire, lifeless and slack, had been her first true burden. It was for that loss she had sworn vengeance. It was for that vow that she had become a paladin.

For vengeance she had fought her way through the ranks. For vengeance she had poured every drop of strength into discipline and training until the world could no longer ignore her. Vengeance had carried her higher than anyone believed possible. At last she had become the youngest captain in the history of the paladin order—and the only woman ever to bear the title.

“Let us meet again.”

She remembered his voice with perfect clarity. She remembered his silver hair, his crimson eyes, the strange warmth of his smile. And yet, though his promise had haunted her every night, though his face had never once faded from her mind, he had never shown himself again. Not once, in eighteen long years.

She had scoured the land, seeking his trail, following every rumor, chasing every whisper. But no one had seen him. No one remembered. It seemed, at last, that she alone bore the memory of that night. The others had let it fade into myth, but Erin would not. She could not.

They thought her deluded. They called her obsessed. They said demons no longer existed.

It did not matter. She would find him. And when she did, she would tear his head from his shoulders and lay it at the altar of her vengeance.

Before dressing for duty that morning, Erin paused again to drink. Another maid, a nervous girl with downcast eyes, brought her a fresh bottle. Erin lifted it, only to pause. This water smelled faintly sweet, a note of fragrance that made her brows furrow.

She lowered the bottle slowly and fixed her gaze on the maid. “Tell me,” she demanded in a flat, dangerous tone, “what did you put in this water?”

The girl startled, eyes wide. “Wh–what? N–nothing, my lady. Nothing at all!”

Erin studied her in silence. She had never paid much attention to her servants, had never cared to learn their faces or names. But she was certain she had never seen this one before—not with those vivid green eyes, not with that face pale enough to show every flicker of fear.

She reached out suddenly, gripping the girl’s chin in her hand. She turned her head this way and that, examining her closely. “When,” Erin murmured, half to herself, “did such a child enter my household?”

The maid’s lips trembled. Tears welled in her eyes. Her body shook like a leaf in the wind.

Just then the head housemaid approached, bowing hastily. “She arrived only yesterday, Captain. A new hand.”

“A new hand,” Erin repeated, her voice low. She studied the girl again. Her gaze was deadened, like eyes that had long since abandoned hope. The longer Erin looked into them, the more unsettled she felt.

The girl’s fear seemed genuine. Her trembling was too raw to be feigned. Erin realized, slowly, that the water truly had not been tampered with.

“…My mistake,” Erin said at last. She released her grip and drew her hand away. The girl nearly sagged in relief, her tears spilling freely.

Yet the moment Erin drank, she froze. The water slipped down her throat, and with it—miraculously—the thirst receded.

It was gone. For the first time in years, the torment eased.

Erin stared at the empty bottle in her hand, stunned. She had tried every drink, every remedy. Nothing had ever worked. And yet this water—this single bottle—had done what nothing else could.

Her suspicion surged. She lifted her gaze back to the trembling maid, watching her with sharp, piercing eyes. The girl glanced up at her timidly, and in that instant Erin saw something. A flash, a shimmer, something cold and uncanny glinting in those green eyes. It vanished too quickly to name, but it left Erin’s skin crawling.

“You…” Erin began, reaching out once more, her brows knitting together.

But the head maid intercepted her again, bowing quickly. “Captain, the carriage has arrived.”

Erin’s hand stilled in the air. She glanced once more at the maid, but in the space of a breath the girl was gone, whisked away.

Erin dressed in silence, unsettled.

When she arrived at the paladin headquarters in her white uniform, every knight she passed stopped to bow. Their respect was automatic, reverent, but Erin barely registered it. Her mind remained fixed on her thirst, her relief, and the mysterious girl who had brought her the only true respite she had known in years.

She did not even hear her name when someone called to her from behind. It was only when a hand landed on her shoulder that she turned sharply.

“Ah, Captain of the Night Demon!” boomed a familiar voice, far too cheerful for her mood.

It was Fran, commander of the Second Division, grinning at her with his usual unshakable good humor.

Erin’s expression hardened. “…Strange, that a man who insists demons do not exist should be so eager to call me by that title,” she said coldly.

Fran laughed, utterly unbothered. “And yet of all the names given you, it suits you best. Doesn’t it?”

The Night Demon—mother of all demons, in legend. Said to bear hair as black as midnight and eyes like blood. It was misfortune enough that Erin resembled that myth. When she had first entered the order, the resemblance had even led some to suspect her of being a demon herself.

It was not a name she embraced. She loathed demons more than any living soul.

Her glare made her feelings plain, but Fran merely shrugged, unruffled.

“In any case,” he added, “your lieutenant seems desperate to find you. He nearly tore my ears off insisting I send you to him.”

“Ten?” Erin asked, her voice sharpening. “For what reason?”

Fran spread his hands. “No idea. He swore only that you must hear it first.”

Erin held his gaze for a moment, then turned without a word. Fran called after her, sounding faintly bewildered, “You do know where he is, don’t you?”

But she did not reply. She walked straight to her study.

Her lieutenant, Ten, was a creature of habit. If not at the training grounds, he would always be waiting in her study. And indeed, when she opened the door, there he stood.

He was tall, his frame sturdy from years of combat, but there was something perpetually hapless about him. His curly brown hair fell into eyes the color of faded green glass, always carrying a look of quiet misery. Freckles dotted his nose. Despite his skill with a blade, his shy nature made him an easy target for teasing among the other knights.

He turned at the sound of the door, startled. “Captain! I—there is urgent news.”

“What is it?” Erin asked.

“There has been a murder outside the capital,” he said quickly. “The body was discovered in a most…unnatural state.”

Her brows furrowed. She accepted the report he held out to her and scanned the details. The more she read, the faster her pulse beat. Her breath caught in her throat, her lips parting.

The corpse was drained, the body shriveled like dried parchment. The neck bore savage wounds, torn as though by teeth.

Erin’s lips curved upward. Her face transformed with a slow, terrible radiance.

A laugh burst from her, wild and unrestrained. “Ahaha—ahhahahaha!” It spilled from her chest, louder and louder, until it filled the study.

At last. At long last.

Her hands clasped together as if in prayer. “Oh merciful God,” she whispered, trembling. “At last You grant me this. At last You give me the chance to slay my enemy with my own hands!”

Her whole body shook with exultation. Her lips pressed against her fingers as she laughed again, unable to contain it.

Ten stared at her, stunned. He had never seen her smile, not once. She was known for her coldness, her unyielding poise, her voice like winter frost. To see her eyes alight with feverish joy, to hear her laugh, was like seeing a stranger in her place.

It unsettled him to his core. He stumbled a step backward before Erin’s hand shot out, seizing his shoulder with fierce strength.

“Take me to the corpse,” she demanded. “Where is it now?”

“In the purification chamber,” Ten stammered. “The body reeked of corruption. The priests insisted it be brought there.”

“Then we go.” Erin released him and strode from the room without hesitation. Her heart pounded so violently it felt it might tear itself free of her chest.

She had hunted him for eighteen years. And now, at last, the trail had returned.

Her steps down the corridor were swift, almost light. For once her movements were not fueled by rage alone, but by hope, by exhilaration. Yet the sight of her joy unsettled the knights she passed more than her usual severity ever had. They shrank back as she swept by, her presence sharp as a blade, alive with a fervor none of them could understand.

When she entered the purification chamber, her gaze flew at once to the body lying beneath a white shroud. Priests clustered around it, their chants low and urgent, their faces tight with unease.

Erin saw none of them.

She strode forward, but the priests rushed to intercept her. “Captain, please! The corpse still carries traces of corruption. Wait until the rites are complete—”

“Stand aside,” Erin snapped. With a sweep of her arm she shoved them away, her eyes fixed on the shrouded form.

And then—

“Little one.”

The voice whispered in her ear again, rich with a softness that made her skin crawl. That voice, gentle as a lullaby. That voice, promising, mocking, intimate.

“Let us meet again.”

Erin’s steps carried her forward, unstoppable.

The time had come.